Those of you breeding, what is your living situation?

[Gtigirl]

My fiance and I are really excited about the possibility of breeding our ball pythons in the future. (Our snakes are still a couple years out from breeding age/weight). This is just a fun, learning hobby for us, but should we ever want to do more than say...1-2 clutches/year, I would be concerned about our living situation.

Presently, we rent a home and I am pretty certain that they will not allow past a certain number of snakes. We would like to move in the next year after we get married, and I am concerned about what our living options are/will be with more than 4 snakes (our current number).

For those of you breeding BP's regularly can you please tell us what your living circumstances are, what issues you've run into, etc. ? I can't imagine that any condo's with HOA's would like snake breeding going on. Same with apartment complexes. Are we going to be forced into buying in order to take this hobby any further than the 4 snakes we have now?

[sweety314]

FWIW: I'm not in the breeding biz (yet), but bought and are raising the hets to do so in a few more years.

I currently own. My mortgage is just 2 yo. Unfortunately, I got laid off in Sept, so I dont know if I'll be in this house for longer than the first of the year. That's how long b4 my UIB runs out, and the fact I paid 3 months extra months in advance to buffer keeping a roof over our heads.

For us, it won't be just the breeding plans either. Now that I'm working the HNS rescue, and our personal collection, we have 32 (as of last night) snakes.....two of which are yellow anacondas.

Despite the market and jobs, if you could swing it, I feel owning would be best for stability and safety for your collection if you want to breed, but buying has its downsides, too.....

Best of luck, no matter WHAT U decide!!!

[Kysenia]

I hope to do some breeding next year. I own a home. My one concern and it may be a little goofy would be breeding or owning too many animals in a apartment or duel occupied residence of multiple units.

My concern would be along the following lines.

Ball Python's are an investment of time, emotion, love and money. I would not trust living in a multiple dwelling unit where the actions of others could cause an event like a fire or what have you. I know that may be being overconcerned.....and events like that can happen anywhere...but raising large groups of animals where you have to deal with other people and the behavior would make me nervous.

None of this may make sense but having the apartment burn down because someone 3 doors down left their curling iron on or thru their joint in a wastebasket and burned the place down would drive me nuts lol.

[Drew87]

I rent a home, with 3 room mates one being my girl. But its kinda hard to do so im really trying to expand my collection and start up breeding i am doing it this year. But we are working on getting our own place so i can have a room dedicated to snakes like i want and not just my bedroom.

[Freakie_frog]

I own a home. But the snakes have a room that's built on to the garage. I use to have them in the house but you get more than a few and it just get's unreal..

[Jerhart]

...I've been in your shoes before!

I was renting a home with 3 roomies while I was an undergrad. None of my roommates wanted anything to do with my reptiles. So I basically turned my room into a snake room with my racks and cages. I had very little floor space....I slept on the floor on a small single mattress. Luckily, my landlord was an 80 year old man who did not do stairs....I lived downstairs so he never looked in my room.

...I then moved into a 2 bedroom apartment with my fiance during grad school. I sold off half of my collection prior to the move. It turned out to be a good idea to reduce my collection because I don't think I would have been able to hide all my racks from the landlords. I lived in this apartment for a year and never ran into any issues with the landlords.

...I currently am renting a home with my wife. My landlord thinks I have A pet snake. My wife has a Cal King she keeps in our office upstairs...I keep my current collection downstairs. I use a couple of privacy screens to...well give the snakes some privacy. My landlord has practically leaned against one of my racks and never said a word.

I feel organization and cleanliness is important in this (really all) situation. I keep my racks/tubs/snake area spotless...well as spotless as I can keep up with. I keep everything organized, all my wires are twisty-tied...so if the day ever does come where my landlord does find them...my snakes look well cared for, secure, and safe.

Good Luck with everything!

[mainbutter]

This is my first year breeding, but crested geckos not BPs. I have a 2BR apartment to myself, one room is pretty much dedicated to the pets.

[Muze]

1 br/1 bath apt. Rent. Currently we have 18 snakes (8 of which are females that have locked up this season, so hopefully there will be many more soon). My landlord could care less what I am doing in my apt as long as it is not dangerous, illegal, or makes noise...lol. However, we are currently looking to buy a condo or small home so we can have a dedicated snake room.

[mooingtricycle]

Should be more options!

Im currently staying back with the parents after a few years out on my own with my boyfriend. Hes doing school and im paying down bills, and we will be looking for a house when things are a bit more stable.

When we were out on our own, we rented 1BR Apartments.

[Turbo Serpent]

I'm Alicia's fiance (OP). Thank you everyone for the insights! I wasn't aware that so many people were in apartments. That's kind of a nice surprise.

I think renting a home would be more difficult - the last house I rented the landlord was always stopping by to check on things (with notice, of course)...and it's kinda hard a bunch of tanks of snakes We don't have any kind of breeder racks/system yet. Just using multiple 10 gallon tanks.